New Micron 7400 PRO 7.68TB NVMe U.3 (7mm) Non-SED Enterprise SSD - $349

[neobenedict]

There simply will be less good deals posted if you require payment to see the forum. Enable email notifications if you're concerned about missing deals.

Don't think making the forum registered users only would do much either although might reduce the amount of spam threads we get...

 

[Cruzader]

although might reduce the amount of spam threads we get...

They already register to post.

If anything the bots hitting forums will want to register, as they can often get a link on their profile also to be crawled by the search engines.

 

[NablaSquaredG]

See that has already been discussed after the ConnectX-6 deal.

That's why I personally don't post anything in Great Deals anymore, but instead share via PM with some trusted ppl here

 

[efschu3]

Well that doesn't help me either.

 

[IamSpartacus]

I think a trusted forum section, viewable only to those who have X number of posts AND Y amount of time as a member could help. Simply making the forum section accessible to those who pay doesn't, IMO, solve the problem.

 

[FlorianZ]

Simply making the forum section accessible to those who pay doesn't, IMO, solve the problem.

For sure. I think we are all talking about free forum registration as opposed to pay-to-play?

 

[Samir]

This was posted on r/DataHoarder etc. too. It would be great if STH members were somehow entitled to cheap drives but

Was it posted here or reddit first? Curious who really found the deal...

 

[Samir]

I think making the "Great Deals" forum visible to registered members only would be a good start. This was suggested here before.

I think this has been done, no?

 

[Samir]

I proposed @Patrick a one-time 10 or 25 US$ fee to join and make specific areas visible to payers only. But that was like a year ago and never received a reply. I thought that would kill the spam, fraudsters and 'funding' calls immediately. But but .... . In terms of @Rand__ proposal and as we advance, people will just become worse in terms of selfishness etc.

You know, there's a way we can do this and just keep it 'within our club'. I know how and whoever is interested in exclusive deals, just PM me because I stopped posting my found deals after seeing resellers exploit them.

 

[FlorianZ]

I think this has been done, no?

Unfortunately no. I just double checked from an incognito window, and this sub-forum is browsable if you're not logged in.

 

[Sacrilego]

On the other hand, I found this forum and registered thanks to the fact that it was public, and that I could see the conversations here on great deals.

There are very informative discussions here related to the great deals posted that if they were to be made private, others wouldn't be able to see.
Some of these covering devices that may not even have information elsewhere.

I know we could move these to the other sections, but it's quite convenient to have them in the same topic, at least while it's still quite active.

As others have mentioned already, making it private does not stop a registered person from posting it elsewhere or buying the whole lot of a deal if they have the money.

I had a chance to buy some of these when it was posted, and some time had already passed by then. But I didn't due to lack of funds. My loss, but oh well. Other opportunities will come later.

 

[Samir]

See that has already been discussed after the ConnectX-6 deal.

That's why I personally don't post anything in Great Deals anymore, but instead share via PM with some trusted ppl here

Yep, same here. PM me too when you find deals and I'll do the same.

 

[Samir]

I think a trusted forum section, viewable only to those who have X number of posts AND Y amount of time as a member could help. Simply making the forum section accessible to those who pay doesn't, IMO, solve the problem.

I actually like this approach. It is similar to what is required for a lot of forums for the for sale/classifieds section.

This can be taken to an extreme as well as we used a 'private forum' to discuss illegal streetracing on a local forum. Every single individual was vetted by the others in that group before a membership was approved. But that also backfired on itself as even though I helped create that, some pissy people decided to remove me and that's the end of that, lol. To do something like this requires a very active admin, which I know Patrick wouldn't appreciate having to babysit.

There is another way though...PM me.

 

[Samir]

Unfortunately no. I just double checked from an incognito window, and this sub-forum is browsable if you're not logged in.

Ah, this is definitely a loophole that should be plugged. If anything it forces people who are taking part in the deals (or reselling them) to be 'known' to the community or at least the admin since they can see the whole userbase.

 

[Sacrilego]

I wonder if it would be possible to have posts that are limited to specific groups until an amount of time has passed.
We could for example, post a great deal, have it only visible to those that have been members for a while and then make it public a few days later.

 

[Cruzader]

Require you to be logged in does nothing if its not restricted from members not given a specific access role.

Needing x posts just leads to more spam in other sections for them to reach it.
Needing x days just keeps some of them out for that period intil let in.
Needing a role leads to the section dieing off as new people dont request it or browse to it.

Beyond making smaller closed chats/groups so you can actualy keep track of everybody, there is not really many solutions that do not come with large downsides.
(the groups come with the downsides of being yet another place to check)

And its not like deals only get posted here to begin with.

+ what is the plan to deal with the resellers that have already been in the forum for years?

 

[Samir]

I wonder if it would be possible to have posts that are limited to specific groups until an amount of time has passed.
We could for example, post a great deal, have it only visible to those that have been members for a while and then make it public a few days later.

Hmmm...I'm not sure if there's anything available in the xenforo forum software without a mod being installed.

 

[Samir]

Require you to be logged in does nothing if its not restricted from members not given a specific access role.

Needing x posts just leads to more spam in other sections for them to reach it.
Needing x days just keeps some of them out for that period intil let in.
Needing a role leads to the section dieing off as new people dont request it or browse to it.

Beyond making smaller closed chats/groups so you can actualy keep track of everybody, there is not really many solutions that do not come with large downsides.
(the groups come with the downsides of being yet another place to check)

And its not like deals only get posted here to begin with.

+ what is the plan to deal with the resellers that have already been in the forum for years?

Generally, spam posts are deleted, and if someone wants to be a part of the community, they do have to be a part of the community. This has worked for decades on other forums, and still works well.

The time constraint is less help for sure. You can register and then just come back a year later when the forum sends you a birthday wish, lol.

Roles is hard too as people finding the deals may not necessarily be in the 'inside circle'. Still, it is one of the only ways to guarantee that a particular deal is only circulated within a certain group.

As far as addressing resellers, I think there's a way to address that via STH not be used for commercial purposes as stated in the rules:

https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/required-action-read-before-viewing-and-or-posting.4/

However, this rule only specifically addresses selling and not purchasing. I think if it also addressed purchasing, that covers any resellers who could potentially lose their access here if using STH as a source for inventory purchases.

 

[Samir]

On the other hand, I found this forum and registered thanks to the fact that it was public, and that I could see the conversations here on great deals.

There are very informative discussions here related to the great deals posted that if they were to be made private, others wouldn't be able to see.
Some of these covering devices that may not even have information elsewhere.

I know we could move these to the other sections, but it's quite convenient to have them in the same topic, at least while it's still quite active.

As others have mentioned already, making it private does not stop a registered person from posting it elsewhere or buying the whole lot of a deal if they have the money.

I had a chance to buy some of these when it was posted, and some time had already passed by then. But I didn't due to lack of funds. My loss, but oh well. Other opportunities will come later.

This is a very good point--there are very, very informative discussions here on the deals when they happen that do help tremendously with seo for the forum. I think from a forum admin point of view, it would make no sense to restrict something from public view that brings in unique traffic because there is no discussion anywhere else. This is a very good point and does bring up a serious issue to making the forum viewable for registered members only.

 

[gb00s]

In terms of pay-per-view and my suggestion to @Patrick, initially this was meant to either help funding of STH and getting rid of these fraudsters at the time. That's literally it. It seems STH is doing well with funding already and the fraudsters seem to be gone.

On the other hand, you can discuss this down the rabbit hole and it will always come down to each of the characters in this race for good 'cheap' stuff. Lets be honest, who comes first gets it first. If there were 1000x nvme's on offer and everyone of us would have gotten his share, there were no discussion. It will balance itself. People won't report. Others will. If there's less reported, the spread kiddies will also have less. Private 'areas' will be build instead. Less community, more fragmentation, more brains to play with

... if someone is bragging to have bought 50 of these, well .... you know where this is leading.